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<< Our Photo Pages >> Calvary Cemetery Hilltop Enclosure - Hillfort in United States in Great Lakes Midwest

Submitted by stonetracker on Wednesday, 01 March 2023  Page Views: 450

Iron Age and Later PrehistorySite Name: Calvary Cemetery Hilltop Enclosure
Country: United States
NOTE: This site is 4.394 km away from the location you searched for.

Region: Great Lakes Midwest Type: Hillfort
Nearest Town: Dayton OH
Latitude: 39.727180N  Longitude: 84.20186W
Condition:
5Perfect
4Almost Perfect
3Reasonable but with some damage
2Ruined but still recognisable as an ancient site
1Pretty much destroyed, possibly visible as crop marks
0No data.
-1Completely destroyed
1 Ambience:
5Superb
4Good
3Ordinary
2Not Good
1Awful
0No data.
3 Access:
5Can be driven to, probably with disabled access
4Short walk on a footpath
3Requiring a bit more of a walk
2A long walk
1In the middle of nowhere, a nightmare to find
0No data.
1 Accuracy:
5co-ordinates taken by GPS or official recorded co-ordinates
4co-ordinates scaled from a detailed map
3co-ordinates scaled from a bad map
2co-ordinates of the nearest village
1co-ordinates of the nearest town
0no data
3

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stonetracker visited on 1st Apr 2021 - their rating: Cond: 1 Amb: 3 Access: 1 Access to both the cemetery and Carillon Historical Park is open to the public. There is a very steep trail from CHP to nearly the top of the bluff, but if there are any remains of the wall they are in a heavily overgrown, trail-less area along a ravine. It may be easier to spot in winter with less vegetation.

Calvary Cemetery Hilltop Enclosure
Calvary Cemetery Hilltop Enclosure submitted by stonetracker : My photo from April 2022 of roughly the same area as the 1895 gully shot. The enclosure wall, if it exists, would be to the right of the fence in heavy brush on Carillon Historical Park property. (Vote or comment on this photo)
Hillfort in Great Lakes Midwest

The Calvary Cemetery site is a ceremonial hilltop enclosure that was likely built by people of the Hopewell culture, sometime between 100 BCE and 400 CE.

Squier and Davis, authors of "Ancient Monuments of the Mississippi Valley," surveyed the site in the mid 1800s. They described it as a sub-circular embankment that runs along the edge of a large bluff overlooking the Great Miami River to the north and encompassing about 24 acres. The west and northwest side was (and still is) very steep and rose about 160 ft above the river. The other sides were more gradual in slope. The "principal" gateway or opening was located in the southern side of the embankment. Just inside the gateway was a ditch approximately 20 ft wide and 700 ft long and aligned approximately east-west. A small conical mound was found in-line with and at about the midpoint of the north side of the embankment.

Much of the enclosure survived until the late 1800s, when most of the bluff was converted into a cemetery and many of the area's ridges, gullies, and contours regraded. The east wall was completely obliterated by 1915, although the south and western sides were still intact according to an account by August F. Foerste, a geologist. He also noted at least one additional gateway on the western side. The north wall only remained visible in small segments and at least some of the long south ditch was either eroded or filled in. Where the walls were still intact, they were no more than 3-5 ft in height, according to Foerste.

Foerste does note that "Indian relics" and skeletons were retrieved in 1877 from the small mound and displayed in the local public library museum. He also mentions that the wall was made almost entirely out of clay. Since the land immediately surrounding the wall was primarily thin topsoil and gravel, it was likely that the clay was transported via baskets from a location at least several 100 yds away.

Today, almost nothing remains of the enclosure wall, and the long ditch and small mound are gone.

Susan Woodward and Jerry McDonald in their book "Indian Mounds of the Middle Ohio Valley" mention that a very small segment of the embankment could still be observed on the north side, running across the bottom of a second smaller gully just north of the first deeper gully. However I was unable to positively ID it (see comments).

Location coordinates are roughly where I think this second gully and the remaining wall may be located. It should be noted that this location is not on cemetery property, but in very dense undergrowth just beyond the fence line boundary in Carillon Historical Park.



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Calvary Cemetery Hilltop Enclosure
Calvary Cemetery Hilltop Enclosure submitted by stonetracker : 1895 photo of section of enclosure wall across gully still visible at that time. (1 comment - Vote or comment on this photo)

Calvary Cemetery Hilltop Enclosure
Calvary Cemetery Hilltop Enclosure submitted by stonetracker : 1895 photo of the section of the enclosure wall that is supposedly extant to this day (Vote or comment on this photo)

Calvary Cemetery Hilltop Enclosure
Calvary Cemetery Hilltop Enclosure submitted by stonetracker : Auguste Foerste's 1915 map of the same site. Note that the east wall is noted as removed. (Vote or comment on this photo)

Calvary Cemetery Hilltop Enclosure
Calvary Cemetery Hilltop Enclosure submitted by stonetracker : Squier and Davis's original survey map of the hilltop enclosure from the mid 1800s. Note the long ditch, small mound, and two gateways. The wall circumnavigates the bluff. Source: A small interpretive kiosk in Carillon Historic Park, adjacent to the cemetery. A very steep trail leads from there to the cemetery. (Vote or comment on this photo)

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Nearby Images from Flickr
Carillon Historical Park
Carillon Historical Park
Carillon Historical Park
Carillon Historical Park
Carillon Brewing Co.
Carillon Historical Park

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